


System_Restore.exe

by Lerry_Hazel



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Epic Bromance, Episode: s03e16 RAM, Episode: s05e13 Return 0, Fake Science, Fix-It, Gen, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-29
Updated: 2019-09-03
Packaged: 2020-09-29 21:08:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20442557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lerry_Hazel/pseuds/Lerry_Hazel
Summary: Doing things differently doesn’t necessarily make them right.





	1. PROLOGUE

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: nothing is mine; even things that don’t come directly from “PoI” are not. 
> 
> Also, this fic exists because most of us hated 5x13, and I absolutely hated 3x16. If you didn’t, you probably won’t like it.

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Charlie McKay is a second-rate actor whose sister Kate has been missing, presumed dead, since 1998. Therefore, when his number came up back in early 2012, it seemed logical to get Mr. Reese an undercover job in the asylum where he could keep an eye on one Stuart Besser, who believed he had discovered a way to travel through time and freely admitted that he had convinced Kate McKay to jump off Brooklyn Bridge. By the time Fusco quietly arrested Charlie’s fellow actor aiming for the same tiny but regular part on a promising TV show, John was no closer to understanding where Kate McKay might be if not happily married to a nineteenth-century aristocrat, – but he made copies of all Besser’s notes, just in case. Harold found the mad scientist’s calculations credibly complex and reassuringly specific, and meant to review them more thoroughly at a later date, but never got around to it.

*******

As he laboriously makes his way down from the “wrong” roof, Finch can’t help thinking he should have: should have realised that in their line of work a moment would inevitably come when even a slim chance to go back in time would be welcome; and John dying in a hale of bullets in the face of Samaritan’s imminent triumph certainly feels like one.

A phone, even Harold’s, is not meant to run this kind of complex Math; the best it can do is an approximation that is supposed to land Finch somewhere within his own life, but it will have to be enough: because there are things he could have done differently ten years and an hour ago; and now when there is nothing left to lose he owes this chance to John; and Ms. Groves; and Joss Carter; and Nathan; and –

Harold forbids himself to look back at the "right" roof as he buttons his coat over his bloodied vest and hails a taxi to Brooklyn Bridge.

*******

He wakes up in a disgustingly familiar hospital bed, the habitual pain in his hip and neck somehow fresh and nearly unbearable: which (unless he died and went to hell) means he has made it back to late October 2010, – where Nathan has been dead for five weeks and Grace has symbolically buried Harold Martin's tie and spare glasses in her garden. But Peter Arndt hasn't managed to kill his wife yet, and the laptop hasn’t made its way to Ordos; the Machine is still muted and chained to governmental servers, and there is a copy of Samaritan code locked in Arthur Claypool' vault. And Harold has a little over a month to set things right – without the benefits of John’s help.

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**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Kate and Leopold” is not even a si-fi movie, it’s a romantic comedy: please, don’t try to achieve time-travel via jumping off tall buildings.


	2. Part One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First of all, thank you so much for all your kudos and comments. The Prologue is so tiny I honestly didn’t expect it to get noticed on its own, but I wrote some of Part One by hand and wanted to get started before the entire fic got put away for another three years :-) ; so, here we go.

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‘Brooklyn Bridge’.

Harold’s voice, weary but determined, filters though the static crackling in the earpiece, and John can’t spare the attention to contemplate the significance of that particular location, but he is aware enough to realise it is not the airport: that Harold is not going to take what might be his only chance to get to Italy, find Grace and forget this nightmare like, well, a nightmare; that Harold is no more prepared to give up fighting than John himself is. Harold is going to keep saving the world, – and that means someone has to keep saving Harold.

John has no idea what he is doing, delirious as he is from pain, blood loss and adrenaline rush. He just knows that Harold still needs him, and therefore succumbing to five Samaritan operatives with their machine guns is no longer an option. So John throws his own gun away, concentrating instead on dragging his battered body closer to the parapet, and jumps off the roof moments before the building is hit with a missile.

He wakes up in a crappy hotel suite only slightly sore, – like he has failed to block a couple of kicks to his midsection, not had a dozen of bullets imbedded in every part of his body not covered by Kevlar. He is also dripping wet and Cara Stanton is standing over his bed with an empty glass.

*******

Whether that’s a miracle, a dream or afterlife, John is not going to dwell on the “hows and whys”. All he knows is that, somehow, the date is December 4, 2010, – and he is not going to waste the chance. Which means he needs to convincingly fake his death in order to get away form CIA and find a way to deal with Peter Arndt that won’t make him the focus of police investigation: and both these goals will be much easier to achieve with the help of one particular person.

John doesn’t remember what Daniel Casey was supposed to have done, but the kid doesn’t look like he deserves their special kind of attention. John will ask Finch to check, just in case, but right now finding Finch himself is much more important. So, when a guy with a shark-like smile that all but spells “mercenary” appears out of nowhere to expertly lead their target away, John happily follows Cara’s convenient order to split up and starts walking in the opposite direction.

*******

The library looks empty but thankfully not uninhabited, although the overturned wheelchair by the dead computer system doesn't bode well. Also, the cold liquid in the forgotten half-drunk paper cup by the monitors is not sencha green, but black chai: the one Finch tends to drink in public to conceal his truly preferred blend, – because he won't release even this tiny piece of trivia to someone who doesn't have his implicit trust. But why would Finch give someone he doesn't trust access to the library, except – John fiercely stomps on a misplaced surge of jealousy. He should be glad there is someone looking after Finch, even if they don't seem to be doing a very good job, considering it is clear from the state of the room Harold’s attacker was met with next to no resistance.

Of course, it is possible that the new – or, rather, the old – Primary Asset wasn’t in the library at the time of the assault, which means they are probably on their way here and a lot of time is about to be lost as John will have to convince them he is not the perpetrator. Or, perhaps, the actual attacker managed to successfully neutralize the – other – Primary Asset before going after Finch, which means they are both now in need of help. Anyway, the first thing John needs is some reliable information. Good thing he knows exactly whom to ask.

*******

‘Listen,’ John says calmly, looking directly into one of the Machine’s innumerable eyes, ‘you don’t know me, but you know Harold – your Admin – is in danger, and I promise I’m going to help. I just need to understand what I’m dealing with first. I know you can’t tell me much, but any little hint will do.’

The nearby payphone remains stubbornly silent; instead, John’s own mobile starts buzzing insistently in his pocket. The string of new messages doesn’t contain the usual seemingly random words of Dewey Decimal System code, or even a readily available Social Security Number. Instead, the first one clearly reads “Dillinger, Rick”, followed by a picture of the very same mercenary who came for Daniel Casey. “Temporary Asset”, the next message provides, and John can’t help smiling: “temporary”, not “Primary”, – but his glee is short-lived, as the other three lines that pop on his screen are “Direct threat to Admin”, a set of coordinates and “Hurry”. Then his phone arbitrarily downloads a very detailed map of New York with a rout to specific location already programmed in.

‘Thanks,’ John nods his head, gives an affectionate pat to the lamppost the camera is hanging from and starts jogging in the direction indicated, relishing the rediscovered agility of his joints.

“HURRY!” His phone chirps, briefly switching back to the “messages” screen. “Eleven o’clock”.

On his left a shiny car, new enough to have an on-board computer, graciously opens its driver-side door, engine already flaring to life. As John climbs in, his lips twitch in a secretive smile: this level of co-operation can only mean the Machine is free – two full years ahead of schedule, and that couldn’t have happened unless whatever force sent John in the past brought Harold as well. Except, why would Harold be working the numbers not even out of wheelchair, with a stranger he didn’t trust, when he could just wait for – oh! In spite of the direness of the situation, John’s smile grows, then turns predatory: he and Harold really need to have a talk about their mutual self-sacrificing routine that clearly isn’t working. But first, he will make Rick Dillinger deeply regret not appreciating the honour of working by Harold’s side.

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	3. Part Two

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As he struggles to blink away the drug-induced haze upon waking up on the library floor, Harold thinks he should have known everything was going a little too well.

He didn’t even have to rob a bank to get to Artie’s secret stash, as he had all the same access to Rudiger Smoot’s imagined possessions; and replacing Samaritan backup copies no one was interested in yet with every piece of footage of Diane Claypool he could find made Harold feel less guilty about destroying his old friend’s lifework. _Ernest Thornhill_’s original plan only required minor alterations to leave the governmental servers physically intact but empty, with a few strategically placed breadcrumbs to “confirm” what NSA already suspected anyway: that Nathan Ingram always had access to the Machine and, apparently, had a contingency plan in case the higher-ups decided to get rid of him, as they did. Of course, Harold couldn’t build an equally sized facility – not without attracting a lot of attention – but the few servers he has managed to smuggle into the Library’s basement offer enough processing power to monitor New York, and, perhaps, that should be enough: Harold’s original intention had been to build an extensive surveillance system, not an omnipotent electronic god, after all.

Mr. Dillinger, unsurprisingly, can’t compare to John Reese. His appalling work ethics, unsubtle malicious snooping and growing smug sloppiness have been getting on Harold’s last nerve, but the plan was to build a broader net of agents to carry on less specific tasks anyway, with Dillinger as a quick fill-in to make sure someone will be in position to interfere when Jessica Arndt’s number comes up for the last time in a few days. Harold has hoped she won’t insist on expressing her gratitude quite so personally. Now it looks like gratitude, once again, won’t be an issue.

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As he struggles to fold his broken body into an uncomfortably low-set car, Harold wonders if the flow of time can’t, indeed, be changed, and all those legends about unknowingly bringing on the exact consequences one is trying to avoid are correct; because he has no idea where things went wrong the first time round, but now it is obviously Rick Dillinger who is about to set off the horrific chain of events that will eventually lead to Ordos and Decima trying to gain control of the Machine and then building their own AI.

Cursing every red light he somehow manages to hit and the Internet connection he keeps losing, Harold stubbornly follows Dillinger’s phone signal hoping it is not coming from a garbage truck and knowing there is actually nothing he can do to stop his rogue employee even if he manages to find him on time. Which he does not.

By the time Harold finally reaches Central Park, there is a neat bullet hole in Rick Dillinger’s forehead, and whoever killed him knew enough to take the laptop. Standing over a dead body that simultaneously represents another life lost to his over-ambitiousness and the crush of his hopes to make things better, Harold feels a brief urge to walk away, to start running and never come back, to disappear completely, – but even that is wishful thinking: he still has a duty to the Numbers, to the lives that can still be preserved, even while his own once again lies in ruins. Which, horrifying as it sounds, means that Mr. Dillinger’s body absolutely cannot be found: too many “damsels in distress” will forever remember his face, and too many fingerprints have been scattered, in his arrogant carelessness, around scenes of weird crimes for someone like not-yet-late Detective Carter to put together.

*******

The very first – and rather unsuccessful – attempt to drive a shovel through frozen soil results in unbearable pain shooting through Harold’s barely healed bones. For a moment he blacks out, and then thinks he might have died – or about to die: because there is John Reese standing in front of him, young and effortlessly beautiful, his sharp features not yet imprinted with months of living on the streets while nursing a badly treated bullet wound and daily consuming his weight in alcohol, as well as all the subsequent blows he had suffered for their cause and Harold personally. And Harold’s mind might try to remind him that it’s 2010, so John Reese is still supposed to be the CIA’s finest: but the hands that catch Harold’s suddenly uncooperative body and guide him to the nearest bench are too gentle, the eyes gazing upon him in concern too warm and the look on the agent’s handsome face too fond, – because John Reese has been following Harold through hell for over five years, so why not back in time?

And then all Finch can do is laugh in helpless relief: because Daniel Casey’s laptop is suddenly dropped on his, well, lap; and John’s eyes crinkle and his lips twitch in a teasing smile, as he deadpans in that trademark raspy voice of his:

‘You take a look at this, Harold. I’ll do the digging.’

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**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Speaking of things that don’t originate from the show but still don’t belong to me, the credit for the punchline goes to one of the numerous blog entries I once went through hoping to find someone who hated 3x16 as much as I did. It’s been years, though, so I’m not sure I can track it down again.


	4. EPILOGUE

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‘John?’ Jessica Arndt blinks and shakes her head disbelievingly: ever since she dared to dial that long-forgotten number she has been seeing things, but now there is indeed the familiar tall figure trying – not unsuccessfully – to open the door to the VIP ward while simultaneously balancing two Styrofoam cups and a big box of doughnuts from a posh café two streets away.

An alarm suddenly starts blaring, and Jessica has to rush to a patient who, as it turns out, must have somehow hit the button in his sleep; and then there is a real emergency, and by lunch time she would have forgotten about the strange encounter entirely, except everyone in the canteen seems to be discussing Mr. Reddington’s deliciously wide shoulders, exquisite salt-and-pepper hair and mysterious boss with suspiciously recent injuries aggravated by an unspecified physical activity. According to Val Humphrey, who always seems to know everything despite not working anywhere near the Reception, poor Mr. Thrush was so bad when he was brought in that he could barely sit upright, but Mr. Reddington was the one who looked terrified, – yet still unwilling to let anyone but the doctor and nurses he had personally chosen based on god-knows-what to approach.

‘And – isn’t it sweet – they are, apparently, considering getting a puppy; and calling it “Bear”. Rather strange name for a dog, if you ask me, unless they are going to get one of those huge ones, and – ‘

Val’s phone comes to life with a mournful whine and starts randomly sending around cute but embarrassing pictures from Val’s four-year-old niece’s tea party, and by the time people stop laughing the lunch break is over. But Jess can’t help thinking about how her John would react to someone he loved being in pain, – and promises herself to get home early, cook a nice dinner and try to once again convince Peter to discuss their problems like civilized adults.

However, an hour before the end of Jessica’s shift the phone rings: Bianca – nurse Menotti – who would have made a wonderful doctor if some youthful mistake hadn’t made it next to impossible for her to get even a student’s loan, has miraculously landed an interview for Crane Foundation Scholarship. Well, it was more like one of the actual candidates missed their flight, and an irritated manager was frantically looking for someone already in New York and available on such short notice, but it was still a chance of a lifetime for Bianca, and Jessica couldn’t possibly refuse to cover for her. By the time she gets home, it’s past midnight and Peter is not there. He is not there the next night, and the next – and the next, – and then the police are searching the house, because someone else has reported him missing: and so the endless round of the same uncomfortable questions begins.

Yes, she did notice everything remotely valuable was taken from the house: Peter would do that when his addiction flared. Sometimes he brought some things back; mostly he did not.

No, she had no idea both the house and the car were somehow in her name only. But she finds paperwork hopelessly confusing, and back in the earlier and happier days of their marriage it was not unusual for her to sign something just because Peter asked her to; and it made sense for him to try and protect his assets from his more reputable creditors.

And, yes, it does seem a little too convenient that the ATM ate Peter’s card just as he was trying to drain their joint account.

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Fortunately, the nightmare is over as suddenly as it began. Peter Arndt is eventually found – in a Mexican prison, already trialed and convicted – and everyone, from the third assistant for the junior vice-consul, who finally deigns to talk to Jessica on the phone, to Andrea – a perky young lawyer who personally knocks on Jessica’s door hoping to snatch a high-profile case, – have to admit there is nothing they can possibly do to help. Former Mrs. Arndt quickly re-learns to live on her own, and when six month later an attractive dark-skinned woman appears on Jessica’s doorstep and invites herself in with a flash of a badge, it is, once again, an unpleasant surprise.

As it turns out, ever since the news of Peter’s relative well-being reached the neighbours, they have stopped speculating on how a fragile woman could have killed her much bigger and stronger husband and hidden his body, and started considering how lucky she had been to have Peter disappear on her before he inevitably went too far in one of their “misunderstandings”. And Jessica has to agree her story vaguely fits the modus operandi of “the Man in the Suit” – even if on the news they mostly talk about hardcore thugs unceremoniously shot through knee-cups and presumably dead teenage girls reunited with grieving relatives; but what makes the police believe she, of all people, would know something about the mysterious vigilante? After all, the hospital turns out to have a downright stalkerish surveillance system that can account for literally every second of Nurse Arndt’s whereabouts on the day of Dr. Arndt’s disappearance.

‘I have talked to your mother,’ Detective Carter explains with fake nonchalance, carefully producing two photos and laying them side by side on the coffee table.

It takes a moment to connect the young uniformed soldier sharing a cocktail with equally young Jessica in the first picture and a blurry shot of a tall man presumably wearing a black suit, – and then Jess fails to stiffen a very undignified snort. John – if he is even still alive – is the most unsubtle person ever. After her ill-advised phone call (which, for some reason, was not on her phone record) she expected – and was afraid – to find her husband on the living room floor beaten into a bloody pulp, but smuggling Peter to Mexico along with enough fake (?) evidence for a swift trial was so not John’s style.

She considers telling the detective about Mr. Thrush’s bodyguard anyway, but decides against it. Part of her is still sure she recognised him, but in fact she only saw Mr. Reddingon’s profile, once, for less than five seconds. And after that he never left his boss’ side for long enough to have a good look. So Jessica feels it’s pretty safe to assume that, even if it was John she saw in the hospital, he was clearly there to take care of someone else. 

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END

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**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BTW, does anyone remember a fic where Finch loses his memory and John nobly gives him back to Grace and convinces them both Harold has been in witness protection? I’ve been trying to find it for ages and it’s driving me absolutely crazy!


End file.
